Whether for passenger or commercial vehicles, tires are manufactured in a wide variety of sizes and shapes. Part of the variation is due to differences in the wheel rims provided as original equipment on vehicles as well as the wide variety of after-market rims also available. These rims can vary in e.g., both width and diameter. Additionally, even for a given rim, consumers may use different tire sizes for the same rim size. For commercial vehicles, differences in load requirements can require different rim and tire sizes.
These differences in size and shape present a very significant challenge for a tire manufacturer. Tire construction is complex and includes multiple components, many of which are not visible from the outside of the tire. For example, one or more layers of material may extend from bead to bead through the side walls and summit or crown region of the tire. One or more belts may be placed under the tread region. The bead region alone may include multiple different rubber components proximate to the bead core.
As a result, the production of a single tire size requires a manufacturer to have the capacity to produce and/or inventory a wide variety of tire components. Moreover, the production of multiple tire sizes over a range of sizes and shapes can be particularly difficult because many of these tire components may not be readily interchangeable between different tire sizes. For example, the carcass ply that is used to manufacture a low profile passenger tire likely cannot be used for a non-low profile tire because e.g., of differences in dimensions. The belt packages used in e.g., a tire size of 235/75R15 versus a tire of size 205/70R14 may not be interchangeable for similar reasons. In other words, many of the components used in tires of different sizes and dimensions are not standardized—i.e. constructed in a manner that allows the same component to be used across tires of different sizes. Of course, the costs associated with the labor, equipment, and inventory of multiple different tire components to accommodate production of a range of tire sizes is substantial and generally increases the costs of training the production personnel as well.
Accordingly, a system that facilitates tire manufacture would be beneficial. More particularly, a system that can be used to standardize one or more tire components so that the same components can be used to manufacture multiple different tires sizes would be useful. Stated differently, tires of different sizes and shapes that can be manufactured using one or more components having the same size or dimension for each such tire would be particularly beneficial.